A blog about media and technology. Sorry, no cat GIFs.

Monthly Archives: December 2015

Most weeks in this space I spotlight the social media fails that made the news: inappropriate tweets from public officials, Facebook posts from criminals that made it easy for police to find them, etc. But since it’s the Christmas season, and I don’t want to incur the wrath of three spirits, today’s post will only focus on the winners: the folks who did social media well. Hope you like it. The failures will return next week.

Deadmau5: The Canadian DJ known for performing in a giant mouse head quit social media this week, acknowledging to fans that he suffers from depression. The apology (posted on tumblr: don’t follow the link if foul language offends you) comes on the heels of an online rant against pop star (and fellow Canadian) Justin Bieber. Deadmau5, whose real name is Joel Zimmerman, deserves some praise for publicly acknowledging his mental health struggles. Since he’s no longer on social media, he probably won’t get mention in this column in 2016. He’s better off working on his music, which he said he plans to do after the holidays.

Hamid Chaudhry: The owner of the Wyomissing Family Restaurant came under attack by some social media trolls recently because they were offended by a fur-selling event held at his business. Activists then started posting nothing but one-star reviews on the restaurant’s Facebook page. Their complaints were less about food than about treatment of animals. How did Chaudhry respond? By asking, on Facebook, for people to stop using his restaurant’s Facebook page for their personal activist causes. As a result — even though he didn’t ask for this — dozens of people countered the one-star reviews with their own five-star reviews.

As of Wednesday, the restaurant’s Facebook page has an average rating of 4.6 stars (out of 5).

This hasn’t stopped the animal-rights activists. They continue to troll the page, including commenting on a post about a sock drive. But the restaurant’s fans are pushing back.

Facebook: Like Facebook or hate it, the social network is everywhere. But the increasing role of photos, videos and GIFs on Facebook has one segment of the population — the visually impaired — missing out. Not for long. The company announced this week it’s testing artificial intelligence tools to describe items in a photo and allow users to ask for the contents of an image. It’s a promising development to bring the ubiquitous network to more people who can take full advantage of it.

I wouldn’t say that social media makes everything better, but it does make many things easier. It’s easier, for instance, to stay in touch with friends and family members. It’s also easier to track down the illegal activities of criminals, as two stories showed us this week.

Residents in Woodland, N.C.: The town was mocked online recently when it put a moratorium on new solar farms. The mockery wasn’t for the ban, but for some of the reasons that residents expressed their opposition: That the solar panels would take sunlight from nearby farms; they would suck up energy from the sun. In a story in the Raleigh News & Observer, council members said the reasons were more pragmatic: The town already has three, and a fourth would make the place too cramped, for one. It’s difficult to blame the town council for the social media dustup. The members can’t be held responsible for the comments and outlandish theories of the residents they represent.Lucky for them.

Wisconsin state Sen. Dave Hansen: Watch what you retweet. That’s a lesson that Donald Trump should learn (but probably won’t), and one that we can hope Dave Hansen learned. He retweeted a message this week that included a derogatory reference to Republican Gov. Scott Walker. Hansen has since apologized and said he instead wanted to share a tweet about limits on campaign corruption investigation. The unfortunate fallout is that Hansen has either deleted or hidden his Twitteraccount.

A man who beat a dog in a Facebook video: Social media can be a tool for good, especially when it comes to tracking down the people who use it for evil. Over the weekend a video surfaced on Facebook of a man beating a dog with a belt. The York County SPCA tracked down the dog in the video and took it and another animal into custody.

A Nebraska pair who trafficked in child porn: Police said a North Platte, Neb., man and woman used social media to send images of child pornography. They were arrested Dec. 11 after an investigation into the online activity. Authorities seized computers, cellphones and other electronics from the home of William Jones and Rayanne Fullman.

And now for this week’s winner:

Spain’s prime minister:

Mariano Rajoy was punched in the head during a campaign appearance in the town of Pontevedra in northwestern Spain. How did the 60-year-old politician respond? By tweeting a video clip of himself working out on a treadmill the next day.

It may not be the most exciting video out there on the Internet, but it’s nice to see Rajoy is undaunted by the impact of a viral video — or by the impact of a punch in the head.

Despite the warmish weather in this, the last month of the year, the “Latino Lunch” series failed to make it to a taco truck. Hopefully in 2016 we will check out Reading’s inventory of mobile taco establishments.

Anthony: For this installment, Adam and I headed to the south side to Dalianny Restaurant on South Seventh Street. But unfortunately, the doors were closed and no one was home.

Never being deterred from a Latino Lunch outing, we headed up to the north side to find another Dominican eatery.

Soon enough we found ourselves in the colorful space that is Jariel Spanish Restaurant at 346 N. Sixth St.

Adam: Colorful is right. The walls are bright salmon-pink with broad accents of lime green. Potted plants and flower vases are everywhere, making Jariel much more homey than some other steam-table restaurants we’ve visited.

Not sure why they covered up that incredible fireplace. (Reading Eagle: Anthony Orozco)

The building also has a fireplace with colorful tile and a dark wood mantle. I don’t know if the fireplace worked, as our table abutted it. My advice to the owner would be to move the table elsewhere.

Anthony: As noted, the food was strictly served out of a steam table. There was no menu and whatever was out on the table made up the menu for the day. Before I describe the food, I think I should also point out some quirky aspects of this place. First, food was served at the counter on a lunch tray that patrons then carry to their table. Second, there were two prominently displayed Coca-Cola refrigerators in the restaurant, neither of which held drinks.

For the meal, I ordered some of the carne with a gigantic, serving of mangu, or smashed green plantains. Both were topped with bright purple pickled onion.

Adam: I had some roast chicken and steamed platanos, also served with pickled onions. In my humble opinion, those were the highlight of the meal. Roast chicken is generally good no matter what Latino restaurant you go to. Steamed plantains tend to have exactly as much flavor as it sounds like they have. But the pickled onions complemented everything really well.

I enjoyed the mangu – and not just because it’s one letter off from an awesome fruit (no, not kangu).. But it was a bit starchy and heavy for my taste. I give Jariel credit for offering not one, but three vegetarian options: In addition to the dishes we ordered, we also tried coyota, a tomato-based vegetable dish. That’s three more vegetarian dishes than we’ve seen at some Latino restaurants around the city.

Anthony: The mangu was pretty good, but again, the steam tables really did it a disservice. Some of the edges were overcooked into a starchy film and the meat also suffered from the same overheating. I would have to say that my favorite part of the meal was the roasted chicken, but as Adam said, the roasted chicken tastes about the same no matter where you go.

WHen we pulled out our wallets to pay, we ran into another patron who was picking up some food to go.

He ordered a drink to go and that’s when we saw it: a gallon jug of bright orange liquid.

Adam: I had to try it, even though I knew little about what it was. Turns out, the bright orange liquid had the consistency, more or less, of a smoothie and the taste exactly like a creamsicle. I found it a little too sweet, but I can definitely see the appeal.

Overall, I liked the fact that we found two dishes here that we haven’t seen at other Latino restaurants. In hindsight, I think the tomato-based vegetable dish served over rice would make a great lunch. Live and learn. The Latino community in Reading has so many microcosms, and it’s fascinating to learn what they eat.

Having said that, one element made me a little uncomfortable. The complete lack of a menu and my extremely limited Spanish skills made it tough for me to figure out what to order. (For the record, I am NOT a proponent of “This is America; speak English!”) The service was friendly, the place was clean and the food was decent. But it’s easy to feel lost and a little helpless at restaurants like this if you don’t speak the language and don’t have any menus or other ways of identifying the food.

I also recognize that’s probably how every single non-native speaker feels about going into just about any other establishment in the area that doesn’t offer bilingual signage. Guess now the shoe’s on the other foot. But I’m not likely to go back to Jariel without someone who speaks Spanish.

Anthony: I think Jariel is a simple neighborhood joint that offers the staples that you mind find on a Dominican dinner table any given night. So while it may not have been the most delicious meal I’ve had in Reading, it was cool to stop by and give it a try. Jariel also caters, though I can imagine it being quite a production for the small operation to feed a large number of people at one time, but at least they are trying. I don’t think I would ever go back there, because there was nothing that really stood out as especially good or unique, but I also wouldn’t go out of my way to not eat there.

George Lucas has created a fantastic universe but he’s allowed some terrible things to happen in it. (AP Photo)

I am looking forward to this week’s premiere of “The Force Awakens” as much as the next guy — unless the next guy is my co-worker Craig Schaffer, in which case I can’t hope to compete.

Like most fanboys, I grew up on the franchise. “Star Wars: A New Hope” was my grand introduction to science fiction and fantasy. Even the drum roll that plays from the first shot of the 20th Century Fox logo is enough to get my heart racing. I’ve seen the first movie in excess of 40 times and I’ve watched all the subsequent movies, bought a ton of the toys and even read the comics when they came out in the early ’80s.

Having said that, I also recognize that there are problems with the “Star Wars” universe that even J.J. Abrams may not be able to fix. Some of it comes from the original trilogy, but most of the problems originate with the prequels that created the backstory.

Allow me to point out five serious flaws with the “Star Wars” universe as set up in the prequels. They won’t keep me from seeing “The Force Awakens,” but even the most die-hard fan will have to find a way to look past them.

5. The slow Death Star construction

This death star takes longer to build than the one that appeared in “Return of the Jedi.” (AP Photo)

At the end of the prequels, we get a glimpse of the building of the Death Star. But the battle station won’t become operational for another 18 years. Yet in less time — between “A New Hope” and “Return of the Jedi” — the Empire manages to build a second one nearly to completion? With that kind of rapid pace of construction, it’s a wonder destroying it a second time took so much effort.
Then again, the timeline of the prequels and the original movies (I still can’t get over the aging of Obi-Wan thing) has always been disjointed. Never mind plot inconsistencies; more than a decade later, I’m still trying to figure out if “Attack of the Clones” had a plot at all.

4. The rapid aging of Obi-Wan Kenobi

How did Obi-Wan Kenobi go from looking like this (left) … to this (right)?

At the end of “Revenge of the Sith,” Obi-Wan Kenobi has had a rough time. But just 18 years pass between fair-haired Ewan MacGregor’s Obi-Wan and the ancient Alec Guinness’. Desert living can be harsh, but Kenobi adds about 40 years to his appearance. No wonder he lets Darth Vader strike him down. At his rate of aging, Obi-Wan would crumble to dust if he returned to Tattooine.

3. The R2D2 continuity

R2D2 – Third wheel to Luke Skywalker’s mom and the most ruthless leader in the galaxy. Doesn’t bother to tell anyone. (AP Photo)

How exactly does R2D2 NOT tell anyone that he used to be the fighter droid for Darth-flippin’-Vader? That seems like it would be a fairly significant detail to tell Luke, Han, et al. when they are on the Millennium Falcon. How didn’t he recognize Obi-Wan, or even the name “Skywalker” when he met Luke?
No wonder C3-PO hates him.

2. Anakin’s all-too-easy transformation to the Dark Side

“Tell me more about these Ginsu knives of which you speak.”

The problem with Anakin Skywalker isn’t that he’s evil but that he’s such a rube. In the prequels, we learn that Darth Vader isn’t born out of a quest to control the galaxy but out of raging teenage hormones. His transformation from heroic pilot to uber-villain lasts only slightly longer than a Vine video.
Here is a summary of how Anakin Skywalker became Darth Vader in Episode III:
…
[Anakin kills Count Dooku]Anakin: I shouldn’t have done that.Palpatine: Want to join the dark side?Anakin: No, I’m still good.Palpatine: Let me tell you an anecdote that makes the Dark Side sound cool.Anakin: That story is completely believable.Palpatine: Kill Samuel L. Jackson!
[Anakin kills Samuel L. Jackson.]Anakin: I shouldn’t have done that.Palpatine: Hey, wanna join the dark side?Anakin: OK.Palpatine: Great. Go kill some kids.Anakin: OK.
…
Either the Dark Side is that tempting or Anakin is such a dupe he’d buy a closet full of Sham-Wows if he lived on earth today.

1. The racism

Then there’s the racist stereotypes. Apparently, in space, no one can hear you stereotype. Exhibit A: Jar Jar Binks. We can all agree that he’s the most deservedly hated creature in the “Star Wars” universe, so I’ll move on to Exhibit B: The Trade Federation aliens that speak in the awful Hollywood stereotype voice. Really, Lucas? An entire galaxy far, far away and you couldn’t invent aliens that didn’t sound like Mickey Rooney in “Breakfast at Tiffany’s?”

…

Having said all this, I look forward to seeing “The Force Awakens” and geeking out at what I hope is a great new story in the universe I’ve come to know and love. It’s still a new addition to the “Star Wars” canon. Which means millions of us fans will gladly watch first and ask questions later. The good news is, “The Force Awakens” can not be worse than the first two “Star Wars” prequels.

I really hope Abrams tones downs the racism, though. We have enough of it on this planet.

Mark Zuckerberg, Max Chan Zuckerberg is held by her parents, Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan Zuckerberg. He is not, despite what you may have heard, giving part of his fortune away to random Facebook users.

Bogus rumors about rich people giving their fortunes away are like obits for long-dead celebrities: No matter how many times they make their rounds on Facebook, people keep circulating them. At least in the case of celebrity obits, you can be reasonably sure that the celebrity is still dead (but not always; remember the Morgan Freeman nonsense?)

The latest completely false post that’s been circulating Facebook the last few days reports that Mark Zuckerberg is giving his $4.5 billion fortune to 1,000 lucky Facebook users. It, too, is false. He isn’t going to make you rich just because you post something on Facebook. If anything, your continued use of the social network merely continues to make him rich.

An underwear thief: As technology advances, so do the methods of criminals. Exhibit A: an underpants thief in Fullerton, Calif. Police there say a 44-year-old man used GPS data from Facebook and Instagram to find his victims. According to the Los Angeles Times, the suspect would look for social posts tagged in a public place, search the posted photos of someone he chose, then also search her GPS data to find out where she lived. After that: Underwear jackpot! He also stole electronics.So don’t turn on location data unless you need to, and count your underwear at night.

A Twitter troll: Police have charged a Puerto Rican man with stalking, harassment and other charges after he reportedlyopened 300 Twitter accounts for harassing people online. Omar Falcon Torres allegedly targeted several dozen people, sending them sexual images and using violent language. He had been using the name “MedeaBot,” so if you recognize that handle among your Twitter followers, time to clean house.

The Erie Diocese: It’s hard to blame the diocese for this, but the church was forced to delete a Facebook post showing a nun posing with a deer she had just killed this week. The photo drew 1.5 million views, but anti-hunting activists began a campaign of harassment and the pressure led to the diocese pulling the photo.

Whether you agree with hunting or not, putting pressure on a group to remove a social media post borders on bullying. Frankly, online activism can be used for so many better causes than shaming a nun.

This week’s winner is an unlikely Instagram star.

Addison Horner: Horner, a native of Sanford, N.C., developed a sizable following on Instagram due to his unique practice: He provides video piano lessons, in the 15-second bursts allowed on the social network. The Eton University senior told the Sanford Herald his goal is to get people playing a basic song on the piano in about two weeks. He has about 100 followers and 149 videos that take you from the absolute basics to pentatonic scales — which I believe is a music term of some sort.

I haven’t started the lessons. But if you’re interested, you can find them at @Thehashtagmusician on Instagram.

I write a lot about social media failures, so it’s fun to find a local organization that knows what it’s doing with social media.

The latest example is the Reading Public Museum in Reading, Pa. Over the last week or so the museum began posting photos on its Facebook page of Maximilian and Leila, two “Elf on the Shelf” dolls that are visiting the museum.

Turns out they get better access to the place than anyone else, and the photos are inventive, creative and sometimes genuinely funny.

That earned him the unofficial title of Most Hated Man on the Internet, but Shkreli’s star has faded since late November, when his company reneged on a pledge to lower the price of Daraprim. Don’t worry; he returned to the news today when he bought the ONLY copy of Wu Tang Clan’s album, “Once Upon a Time in Shaolin.” Once again, the Internet exploded with outrage.

He did himself no favors when he said that he’d only play the album if Taylor Swift visited and asked for a listen. Otherwise he’s saving it for a rainy day. And Shkreli comes across less as a hardcore devotee of music, and more of a diehard collector of trinkets. As the Bloomberg story points out:

He purchased Kurt Cobain’s Visa card in a Paddle8 auction and occasionally produces it to get a rise out of people when it’s time to pay a check.

How does he announce his purchase of the sole “Once Upon A Time In Shaolin?” Like this:

Poll suggestions: which artist should I now approach to buy my next private album from?

But Wu-Tang Clan doesn’t come across any better. They made one copy of an album, to make a statement about the music business.

“We’re making a single-sale collector’s item. This is like someone having the scepter of an Egyptian king,”

frontman RZA told Forbes.com in 2014. The goal is to foster a new appreciation for music as art.

Makes sense, in a way. When more people are streaming music rather than owning it — or paying for it — I can understand the urge to think of it again as a tangible work, like a painting or a novel.

But creating only one copy of your work, then selling it to the first person willing to pay seven figures, doesn’t restore integrity to art. It caters to the super-rich aristocrats who value the pursuit of money and things above all else — including an appreciation for music as art.

A $2 million price tag for the lone copy of an album only attracts one kind of buyer. And it looks like Wu-Tang Clan found him.

It’s December, so that means it’s time to look back on the past 11 months and reflect on what we endured as a planet. Twitter’s annual “Year in Twitter” retrospective was released this week, and it is a fun way to look back at some of the biggest social trends, whether they were powerful stories or inexplicable trends (remember that damn gold-and-white dress?).

At the top of Twitter’s Most Influential moments was the pair or horrible attacks in Paris this year: First, #JeSuisCharlie, which became a social phenomenon after terrorists killed a dozen people in the offices of Charlie Hebdo, a French satirical newspaper. Then there was #PrayforParis, the hashtag that represented worldwide sentiment after another terror attack that killed more than 100 in a series of strikes throughout the city Nov. 13.

Then there was the #BlackLivesMatter hashtag, which gave rise to a political movement at a time when killings of blacks by police officers sparked national outcry with increasing frequency.

It wasn’t all gloom; the Women’s World Cup was a hit on social media (USA! USA!) and so was the #PlutoFlyBy. When Nasa’s New Horizons craft passed Pluto and took photos of the ex-planet, the images generated more than a million tweets on July 14.

I won’t get into the most popular accounts on Twitter in 2015, because I don’t think social networks generally are interesting if we just rely on them as measuring sticks of someone’s influence. Similarly, I have no interest in the “New Voices” list, which contains mostly famous people.

The real value in The Year on Twitter lies in looking at what people talked about, not who was talking. I frankly don’t care about One Direction or Taylor Swift or the fact that Adrian Brody now has a Twitter account. That’s just vapid celebrity gossip that distracts from the real point of the social network: the hashtags and conversations that fill the flowing stream of tweets.

That’s why I liked reading the popular hashtag lists. They showed what people were talking about: ISIS, jobs and *sigh* One Direction. But the #LoveWins hashtag, celebrating the legalization of same-sex marriage throughout the United States, made two of Twitter’s Top 10 lists. And the most popular “Pastime” hashtag was #love.

That’s one of two trends that gives me hope for humanity in 2016. The second is the fact that the late Leonard Nimoy’s final tweet:

Smiling shoppers at Best Buy, on Thanksgiving in Durham, N.C. , are not what the viral videos showing Black Friday fights would lead you to believe represents most shoppers. (Bernard Thomas/The Herald-Sun via AP)

We were driving to Reading from Allentown about 6:30 on Thanksgiving evening when my wife and I passed the Wal-Mart on Route 222. The parking lot was full of cars and SUVs. People were ready to crowd the aisles and I hadn’t even finished digesting the turkey, mashed potatoes and stuffing I devoured at my in-laws’ house.

If I really wanted to see shoppers acting insane and violent on a day set aside for gratitude, I could just check online. The phrase “Black Friday Brawl” yields a staggering 286,000 results on YouTube.

For years Black Friday has bled into Thanksgiving Day. But while the shopping tradition predates social media, the rise of viral content has turned Black Friday into a golden opportunity for people to showcase the worst excesses of human behavior and post it online for the world to see.

I fail to see the redeeming value in these videos. They do little except peddle a narrative that American shoppers are materialistic, greedy and violent. I suppose they also provide entertainment for those people who like to view the worst in human behavior. But can’t videos of pro athletes getting hit in the crotch suffice?

Black Friday and Thanksgiving sales might be here to stay, as will the inevitable fight videos. But not all stores teem with angry mobs on Thanksgiving and Black Friday. On Monday the National Retail Federation reported that sales in stores from the two days fell from the same period last year. If that trend continues, the plethora of Black Friday brawl videos will show an increasingly inaccurate picture.

But maybe accuracy isn’t the point. These videos serve to ridicule the people in them. They also help to reinforce stereotypes — about Wal-Mart shoppers, about Americans, etc. The Washington Post’s Luke O’Neil argues, convincingly, that fight videos are a way to shame the poor.

In short, they hold no inherent value except as a way for the viewer to look down with derision and mockery on the subjects.

We have social media to thank for their continuing popularity, since videos help drive eyeballs to Facebook, et al., and websites that depend on clicks will gladly convert said videos to “articles” and thus perpetuate the viral nature of this nonsense.

The fight video phenomenon will only stop when we stop watching them.

I’m indifferent to shopping on either day. If you enjoy the experience, good for you. If you’d rather stay away from the crowds, that’s fine too. But keep the violence to a minimum, no matter what you do.

For what it’s worth, I DID go shopping on Black Friday. I bought a Christmas tree at a local farm. We picked the first tree we saw, paid for it and tossed in the back of the car.